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<title>Beyond the Briar Patch or How Will Riker came to Regrow his Beard by joely_jo</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25034317">Beyond the Briar Patch or How Will Riker came to Regrow his Beard</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/joely_jo/pseuds/joely_jo'>joely_jo</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: The Next Generation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Basically a bit of PWP wrapped up nicely, Decisions, F/M, Friendship, Imzadi, Riker's Beard, Romance, Star Trek Insurrection - Freeform, Starting again, moving in</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 08:42:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>10,810</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25034317</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/joely_jo/pseuds/joely_jo</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>'"You know, you could be as furry as a Chameloid, and to me you'd still be the sexiest thing in a Starfleet uniform," he murmured, pressing his bearded face into her neck as he covered her exposed skin with tiny kisses.'</p><p>The title pretty much sums it up tbh. Two parts. First part is innocent enough. Second part will be... less so. ;)</p><p>COMPLETE</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>William Riker/Deanna Troi</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>60</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. One</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Author’s Note: Timeline wise, this story sits just less than six months after the events in Star Trek: Insurrection. While I realise that there are a whole bunch of Trek books that deal with this period in time, for the purposes of this story, I am ignoring them.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Two more days sick leave, then you need a physical <em>and</em> a psychological evaluation. And if you pass those, <em>then</em> you can go back to duty.”</p><p>“You’re kidding me…” Incredulous, Will stared at Deanna. He was still in bed, while she had been up for nearly an hour, showering and getting herself ready for the day. “You and Beverley are evil twins.”</p><p>It had been two weeks since he’d been seriously injured while on an away mission to Garrada IV. His team and the three Federation scientists they’d been protecting had been ambushed by a swarm of furious rebel soldiers as they’d tried to download essential information from the computer core at the research station in the midst of a military takeover. Unable to get an immediate beam up to the Enterprise due to a maliciously employed scattering field, Will had put himself between the rebels and the scientists and defended them until the beam out had been successful. He’d suffered a long list of injuries for his trouble, and when he’d finally made it back to the Enterprise, he’d been unconscious and fading fast.</p><p>If it hadn’t been for Beverley and her team, he’d more than likely have died from his injuries, but thankfully, the beam out had come not a moment too soon and she’d been able to fix him up. Since then, however, she’d placed him on mandatory sick leave until she deemed him fit enough to return to duty. Deanna had been watching him like a hawk too, reminding him regularly that life-threatening injuries often brought with them all kinds of mental trauma too. At first, he’d been happy to convalesce, but as the days had rolled by and he’d started to feel better, the enforced leave had begun to grind him down.</p><p>“Evil twins? We don’t look anything alike,” said Deanna. She was dressed in uniform, ready to begin her duty shift, and was perched on the end of his bed, eating a banana.  </p><p>“Well, all right then, but you’re certainly in this together.”</p><p>“Will, you were badly injured. You shouldn’t rush yourself back to work.”</p><p>“Deanna, I swear… I’m fine. I’m fit and well enough to return to work. I’ve had much worse than this and been back on the Bridge sooner.”</p><p>“So you’ve been stabbed in the gut and had, what was it, fourteen broken bones before?”</p><p>“Well, no… but…”</p><p>“But nothing.”</p><p>He sighed heavily. “If I have to spend another day skulking around here, I’m going to need a psychological evaluation for sure.”</p><p>Deanna regarded him with a sceptical and largely unsympathetic look. “Don’t be so dramatic.”</p><p>“I’m not. I don’t do well with solitude.”</p><p>“So go and book a holodeck out. Go fishing or hiking or take a good book to a beach and just relax.”</p><p>Will made a face. “That’s still solitude, just dressed up.”</p><p>For a moment, he looked so forlorn she thought about relenting, then she steeled herself against his puppy dog expression. “Two more days, Will,” she said in a softer tone, popping the last of her banana in her mouth. “That’s hardly an eternity.”</p><p>“It’ll feel like it.” He sidled along the bed to sit next to her, suddenly all sweetness and light. “I miss you while you’re working.”</p><p>“No, you don’t,” she replied. “You’re just trying to make me give in.”</p><p>“Am not.” He rested his head on her shoulder. “I do miss you when you’re not here.”</p><p>“Will.”</p><p>“It’s true. This place doesn’t feel right without you here.” He twisted slightly, then took her by the shoulders and made her face him. “Move in with me.”</p><p>To her credit, Deanna didn’t look totally shocked. A small frown appeared between her eyes and she tilted her head as she regarded him thoughtfully. “Here?”</p><p>“Yeah, or we can ask the Captain for a bigger cabin… It doesn’t matter. I just think we should stop living out of gym bags and pretending that we don’t spend more or less every night together.”</p><p>“That’s a big step, Will. Not to mention a sudden change of subject… I’ll think about it today, okay?”</p><p>“Say yes now,” he begged gently. “Then I’ve got something to be doing all day while I wait for you to come back.”   </p><p>She pressed her forehead against his and took in a breath that was a little shaky from his perspective, but she nodded. "All right," she said softly, and his face split into a grin. But then she added, "On one condition."</p><p>He waited for it.</p><p>"You shave today."</p><p>He laughed, running his hand over the beard he’d allowed to grow back in as his jaw had been healing, then realised that she was serious. "Deanna, my face is still pretty bruised and painful," he said. "It'll hurt." He affected a pout.</p><p>“No beard,” she said crisply, standing up and smoothing her uniform down. “Or I keep my cabin and you keep yours.”  </p><p>Will’s mouth fell open. "Now you’ve got to be kidding me.”</p><p>She shook her head slowly.</p><p>“Humph. Some people would say that you’re threatening me, Counsellor.”</p><p>She huffed and clomped over to the replicator, then ordered a cup of mint tea. "I’m just putting all my chips on the table. I like my cabin. And you know what I think about the beard.” She took a tentative sip of her too-hot beverage, set it on the dining table and then went back to the bathroom. He followed her. Their eyes met in the mirror as he stood behind her and watched her give her hair one last tweak.</p><p>“The stakes have gone up, though, haven’t they? You were quite happy with my beard last night,” he said archly. “In fact, I’m pretty sure I heard no complaints at all when I had my mouth on you.”  </p><p>She ignored him, and crossed the room on her way to the door, trying to get by him without incident. He waited for his moment and pounced, sweeping her into his arms and then pushing her onto his bed so that she was trapped underneath him.</p><p>"You know, you could be as furry as a Chameloid, and to me you'd still be the sexiest thing in a Starfleet uniform," he murmured, pressing his bearded face into her neck as he covered her exposed skin with tiny kisses.</p><p>Underneath him, she yelped and wriggled madly, trying to dislodge him, but he made sure to keep just the right amount of his weight on her to keep her pinned.</p><p>"Will!"</p><p>When he wouldn’t let go of her, she pinched above his nipple.</p><p>"Ow!" He bit her shoulder through the material of her uniform in retaliation, and then used her distraction to adjust her position underneath him, trying not to laugh. "Kiss me," he said petulantly and rubbed his cheek against hers.</p><p>"Yuck," she said, turning her head. “No.”</p><p>"Kiss…" Grinning, he hovered above her cheek so the bristles of his beard regrowth tickled against her skin once again.</p><p>"No," she choked out, giving in to giggles at the silliness of the whole thing. It felt almost like they were back in the Briar Patch, behaving like teenagers again.</p><p>"Kiss," he said to her again. With a sigh, she leant up and gave him a tiny peck. He feigned a look of mild disgust. "Come on, now, a real kiss, spoilsport."</p><p>"Spoilsport?! You don’t really want me to kiss you, you’re just trying to prove a point," she grumbled, "and you are messing up my hair."</p><p>Will raised his eyebrow mockingly. "Yes, such a mess," he said in a tragic tone. "You won't look at all like the most beautiful woman to ever walk the decks of the USS Enterprise."</p><p>"Flattery will not help your cause, Commander," Deanna said.</p><p>“You sure about that?”</p><p>She regarded him thoughtfully for a moment, then put her arms around his neck and pulled him down to her. Will responded immediately and as he returned the kiss, he slipped his hand under her neck, going for the clasp on her uniform. He was well-practised at this and before she knew it, he’d slipped it open and was beginning to peel the material off her.</p><p>Fully aware of where exactly this was heading if she didn’t cut it off, Deanna used a combination of her pelvic muscles and his distraction to heave him off her, before standing and straightening herself up.</p><p>When he reached for her again, she skittered out of reach towards the doorway. “My shift starts in ten minutes. And you shouldn’t be exerting yourself like this.”</p><p>“Exerting myself?” he laughed. “I seem to recall plenty of exertion happening last night without objection.”</p><p>She narrowed her eyes. "Shave," she said to him pointedly.</p><p>“You really are a spoilsport, Deanna. Here I am making a bold and pretty serious offer and all you’re bothered about is the fuzz on my face.”</p><p>Pausing, she saw through his flippancy and realised that he was actually quite invested in this suggestion he’d just made. The beard was mostly secondary. “Will, look, I’m not trying to be a spoilsport. It’s just that we’re talking about a big decision. It’s only been five months since the Briar Patch. It just feels… quite soon.”</p><p>“And my beard is part of my personality.” He pouted a moment, then added, “Of course it’s a big decision. But we’ve known each other for fifteen years. I don’t think anyone would call that moving fast.”</p><p>“You know what I mean.”</p><p>She went to him willingly now and embraced him. “I know what you mean… But do you remember what I said the night we left the Ba’ku homeworld?”</p><p>He thought back. “You said that if we were going to do this again, it had to be for real. No games.” Fixing her with a tender look, he ran his fingers through her hair. “That this wasn’t just friends with benefits.” He leaned in and kissed her slowly. “I think I’ve made my feelings clear on that, Deanna.”</p><p>She nodded, pulling back. “Then shave the beard. See you later, Will. Make sure you rest up and enjoy your last day of peace and quiet. Tomorrow’s going to be full of medical appointments.”</p><p> </p><p>***</p><p> </p><p>After she’d gone, Will returned to the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror, staring at his own face. It had never taken him long to grow a beard – a few days, at most – and it had been nearly two weeks since his face had seen a razor, so he was looking decidedly scraggly. He ran his fingers through the hair growth contemplatively. It had taken him a long time to get used to himself without a beard again, but before the ill-fated away mission to Garrada IV, he’d actually just about stopped having to do a double take when he caught sight of his reflection. Now, though, the beard was back with a vengeance and all of a sudden, he realised how much he’d missed it and how much he preferred himself with it.</p><p>Had he only shaved it off for Deanna? A large part of him knew the answer was yes, but whether it had been metaphasic radiation or just a deep-seated desire to always see her happy, he couldn’t be sure. He wanted to see her happy now, but he was no longer so convinced that shaving off his beard was what would really make her happy. Sure, she might complain and fuss but he had the feeling the issue was bigger and more important than just a preference for a clean-shaven Riker.  </p><p>He stared a moment longer, contemplating what to do, then turned away and hopped into the shower. He’d think it over; after all, it wasn’t like he had anything to do today.</p><p> </p><p>***</p><p> </p><p>Deanna’s busy morning of counselling appointments had just concluded and she was about to order herself some much needed lunch when Captain Picard’s voice came over the comm summoning the senior staff to the Observation Lounge for a briefing. Sighing, she cancelled her request to the replicator and resigned herself to going hungry for the time being. She downed the last of the glass of water on her desk then headed out of her office. In the turbolift, she was joined by Beverley Crusher.</p><p>“Well, so much for my lunch,” Crusher groused as the lift got back underway.</p><p>“Mine too. I was just about to sit down when the call came.”</p><p>“Oh well, duty calls. How’s the invalid doing?</p><p>“He’s bored, frustrated, and feeling sorry for himself,” said Deanna. “He hates not being allowed to work. He was fine with it at first, when he was genuinely feeling sore, but now he’s healed, he’s like a bear with a thorn in his side.”</p><p>“In my experience, men fall into two categories. Those who always make out that they are much worse than they appear, and those who will deny any form of injury or illness until it becomes literally intolerable. Jack was definitely the former,” Crusher admitted with a grin. “A terrible hypochondriac. If he wasn’t well, everyone knew about it. Jean-Luc used to say it was a good job he married a doctor, otherwise he’d have been the curse of sickbay on every starship he served on.”</p><p>Deanna laughed. “Will is definitely the latter. If he’s complaining about something hurting, you know it’s bad.”</p><p>“I popped around after my shift yesterday to check in on him and he was quick to tell me that he felt absolutely fine and fit for duty,” said Crusher. “He <em>did </em>seem fine, though. All the broken bones are healed beautifully and other than a need for a bit more effort with the physiotherapy exercises I showed him, the wound to his side looks good too.” She glanced at her friend. “I see he’s growing his beard back in again…”</p><p>“Yes… He said his jaw hurt when he tried to shave.”</p><p>Raising her chin and evaluating the obvious disapproval in Deanna’s tone, Crusher murmured, “Ohhhhh, I see.” She paused a moment. “You can’t deny it suits him, Deanna.”</p><p>“Don’t you start.”</p><p>“Start what?!” Crusher said, all innocence all of a sudden. “I was just making an observation.”</p><p>The turbolift came to a halt and the doors opened onto the Bridge. “He asked me to move in with him,” whispered Deanna as they made their way across to the Observation Lounge.</p><p>“And what did you say?”</p><p>“I told him he had to shave the beard.”</p><p>“Deanna!”</p><p>“What? It’s prickly.”</p><p>“I don’t believe you,” said Beverley. “Will Riker, Mr Never Cooling My Space Boots For Any Woman asks you to move in with him and you tell him to shave his beard off first?!”</p><p>Deanna glanced at her friend. “You think I was too harsh…”</p><p>“I think you’re nuts.”</p><p>They walked into the Observation Lounge, where the Captain, Data and Geordi were already sitting at the table, apparently waiting for them. “Well, thank you,” hissed Deanna as they took their seats. “It’s nice to know I have some support in this.”</p><p>Crusher held up her hands in mock surrender. “Hey, don’t blame me. You brought it up. I’m just giving you my opinion.”</p><p>When the meeting was over, they boarded the turbolift again and headed for their respective domains. “I just think it’s soon,” said Deanna once the doors had closed and they were in private once again. “It’s not been six months since the Briar Patch.”</p><p>“Jack and I moved in together after three weeks, Deanna. When you know something’s right, you know it’s right. And if you ask me, you and Will have known this is the right thing for you both for a lot longer than six months.” Pursing her lips, Deanna contemplated and in the silence, Beverley jumped back in. “In fact, I’d hazard a guess that this has nothing really to do with Will’s beard. I think you’re just deflecting…” she said.</p><p>“Deflecting from what?”</p><p>“From making a big decision. You’re scared that everything is going well this time and you’re waiting for something to happen to screw it up.”</p><p>“Now you sound like the counsellor,” she said.</p><p>Beverley spread her hands in a gesture of innocence. “Well, sometimes when we’re looking in the mirror, we medics can’t see what’s staring us in the face.”</p><p>Deanna sighed. There was a kernel of truth in Beverley’s analysis. She was holding her breath, waiting for the comfortable happiness they’d been basking in to be disrupted somehow. She’d thought it might have come after Garrada IV, but if anything, all that incident had done was bring them closer. In fact, she realised, it had been a week since she’d even slept in her own bed.  </p><p>“Hey,” said Beverley, interrupting her thoughts. “Looks like we’ve both missed lunch now, so how about a bite to eat this evening? And we can talk more then if you like?”</p><p>“Actually, that sounds wonderful. I’ve got to make a start on crew evaluations this afternoon, because I’d rather have the groundwork done before Will comes back, but I think dinner sounds like something to look forward to. Officer’s Mess?”</p><p>“Perfect. Whoever’s done first, come and get the other.”</p><p>It turned out to be just the thing to get Deanna through the afternoon. The Enterprise crew evaluations were a gargantuan task, completed on a three monthly rotation, with the officers and the enlisted crew split into three waves, resulting in a task that had to be done promptly at the end of every month. Initially, Will had done the evaluations alone, but he’d quickly found that the task was much too onerous to complete by himself and so he’d turned to Deanna for relief and assistance. The monthly shared task and the healthy discussion and debate it had prompted between them had helped to build their friendship from the embers of their lost romance. In fact, it had become something that they almost looked forward to – an excuse to sit together in one another’s company, often with lunch or dinner or drinks, under the guise of necessary and important work.</p><p>By the time Beverley arrived at her office, Deanna was so engrossed in her task she hadn’t realised how the afternoon had worn on. “You ready?”</p><p>“Is it that time already?” said Deanna, looking up bleary-eyed from a PADD. She threw it down on the desk and stretched out her back and neck. Doing the evaluations without Will had been a strange, tiresome and time-consuming experience and she’d felt his absence palpably.</p><p>“It sure is,” Crusher replied with a smile. “Shift ended twenty minutes ago. Let’s get going.”</p><p>The mess hall was already moderately busy with others who had recently finished their shifts and were dropping by to meet friends or catch something to eat or drink and a low hum of conversation filled the air. They ordered and found a table in front of the windows. The stars were streaking as the Enterprise warped to its new destination and it was always an arresting sight, so Deanna watched them for a moment, allowing the steady sensation of movement to relax her. “So, are you going to let him keep the beard?” asked Beverley, dropping into the seat opposite her and coming straight to the point, as was her way.</p><p>Deanna’s shoulders sagged. She turned the glass of Cyndri tonic she’d ordered between her fingers, staring in to the depths of the pale blue liquid contemplatively. “I knew you weren’t going to let this drop.”</p><p>“Well, that’s what friends are for, isn’t it?” Beverley said.</p><p>The sounds of the room slipped away from Deanna as she considered the matter. The truth was, she’d been thinking about what Beverley had said to her earlier on and off all afternoon, so much so that the thoughts had intruded upon her analysis of a whole variety of crew members. At length, she sighed and replied, “You’re right… It isn’t really about the beard.”</p><p>“I knew it!” said Crusher with a triumphant grin.</p><p>“I mean, I prefer him without one, but it doesn’t really bother me all that much. He’s still Will and, of course, it’s his choice.” A long sigh slipped out with the sense of relief her confession gave her. “It’s strange considering how long we’ve been friends, but I don’t think we’ve ever really talked about how it ended between Will and I.”</p><p>Regarding her friend with a gentle look, Beverley intertwined her hands together and explained, “I know he left Betazed to take a commission on the Potemkin and you stayed behind. He told me once that he’d asked you to come with him, but you’d said no, and then you didn’t see each other until you were both assigned to the Enterprise.”</p><p>“That’s a potted history, but a fairly accurate one.”</p><p>A smiling waiter arrived with their food and placed the plates down on the table. “I don’t know, Deanna, I’ve always had the impression that the potted history doesn’t really begin to cover it. Whatever was between you two was more than just a love affair. I understood that pretty early on. Even before I really knew either of you, the way he looked at you was… different somehow.” She leaned forward, picking up her cutlery and lowered her voice. “We all know Will Riker had trouble keeping it in his pants back then, but I never saw him look at any one of those girls the way he did at you.”</p><p>Deanna knew the looks that her friend was talking about. Will had never made any secret of her importance to him – it was one of the things she loved about him even now. She nodded slowly, her eyes growing distant with thoughts of a dozen and more years ago, of the moment when the Captain had introduced them to one another on the bridge of the Enterprise, of the times when she could’ve sworn that he was still inside her head like he’d been back on Betazed.</p><p>“Is it because of that word you call each other? Imzadi…” said Beverley, interrupting Deanna’s thoughts. Deanna drew in a slow breath. She prodded absently at the fragrant rice and vegetable dish she’d ordered.  </p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“It means ‘beloved’, doesn’t it?”</p><p>“It does, on a very simple level. But it doesn’t translate particularly cleanly. I suppose the closest comparison I could make would be with a Vulcan bonding, although it isn’t something associated with marriage, or in any way planned or engineered like the Vulcan ceremony. To be imzadi with someone means that you have encountered the first person with whom you have shared a part of your soul.”</p><p>“Like falling in love…”</p><p>“It’s more than that. It is possible to love someone and not be imzadi, and likewise to be imzadi and fall <em>out</em> of love with someone. But you can be imzadi with only one person in your life; you can have other bonds with other people, but often the imzadi bond is so powerful and so compelling that a couple who share it with one another do not wish to seek out others.”</p><p>“Wow. So I guess that’s why you and Will are so close.”</p><p>“It’s part of it, certainly. But we really are best friends, as well. When we realised we’d be working together on the same senior staff, we came to an understanding. It took a little while, but we made the decision together that we would do our best to put our past behind us and to concentrate on working together. It would have been very easy to fall back into a relationship again, though. The attraction was always still there.”    </p><p>“But you chose not to go with it.”</p><p>“Yes…” Deanna sighed. “Beverley, it took me <em>years</em> to get over it when he left. Even when we met again on the Enterprise, I was still hurting. And to have to see him again and work with him… I don’t think it’s possible to really understand how painful it is to break an imzadi bond when you’re not Betazoid.”</p><p>“You’re only half Betazoid, Deanna.”</p><p>“I know that. I can’t even imagine how much worse it would have been if I’d been full Betazoid.” She looked down at her meal, studying the colourful vegetables carefully as if she expected them to hold some kind of solution. “It felt like he’d ripped out my soul, torn it in two and shoved it back inside me again. For the longest time, I felt like I’d been physically hurt.”</p><p>Beverley frowned. “Did you ever ask him if it felt the same for him?”</p><p>“I did once, after a few glasses of his Aldebaran whisky, and no, I don’t think he felt it quite like I did. He missed me and he hated himself for a while, wondered if he’d made the right decision. He said that sometimes, when he was alone and he was thinking about me, he felt like there was an ache inside him. I suppose that was his perception of the bond between us.”</p><p>“Oh Deanna,” said Beverley and there could be no denying the sympathy in her voice, “I think this explains a lot of why you’re hesitant now. I’m no counsellor, obviously, but I can recognise someone being wary of being broken hearted again.” She smiled wryly. “I felt much the same after Jack died. It took me a long, long time before I could even look at other men and feel anything.”</p><p>Deanna felt tears beginning to prickle in her eyes and she blinked them back, looking away from her friend and out towards the stars streaking outside the window in order to centre herself. She took a deep breath and continued, “So when I think about it all objectively, I know why I’m hesitating to move things on with Will. I am afraid. I’m afraid of how strongly I feel and how if he leaves me again, how I’ll cope with it all a second time around.”</p><p>“I think you need to talk this through with Will,” said Beverley after a few minutes of silence.</p><p>“Oh, he knows… And he’s promised me that it’s for real this time. But, still… I can’t help the uncertainty I feel. I trust him, but there’s a part of me that nags and whenever he talks about next steps or moving things forward, that part of me gets louder.”        </p><p>Taking a few mouthfuls of her dinner, Beverley studied her carefully. “Do you <em>want</em> to move in with him?” she asked.</p><p>With a smile, Deanna nodded. “Yes.” She paused a moment, then clarified, “When you first discharged him, I let him have a few nights on his own, but even then, I missed him. It’s strange… I could spend every waking minute in his company and not grow tired of him really.”</p><p>Beverley chuffed softly. “Then I think you know your answer, Deanna. And I have to admit, I’m a little bit jealous.” She measured a tiny distance between her thumb and forefinger. “I have never wanted that of any man I’ve known. I’ve always valued my personal space.”</p><p>“So if it’s so clear, why do I feel like I’m backed into a corner? I’m a grown woman, and yet this morning there I was behaving like a spoilt child!”</p><p>“Hello Beverley, Deanna,” said a familiar voice and both of them looked up to see Will smiling down at them. He was dressed in a blue silk shirt and darker blue pants and his face was clean shaven.</p><p>“Will… what happened to the beard?” said Beverley in an amused tone as she regarded him standing above them.</p><p>His eyes flicked to Deanna and his face turned serious all of a sudden. “Ask Deanna,” he said, his voice soft but loaded with significance.</p><p>Narrowing her eyes, Beverley looked back at Deanna. “Deanna?”</p><p>“Will, you didn’t have to do that…” she murmured, so quietly she almost couldn’t be heard.</p><p>Will drew in a deep breath. “Maybe not, but it seemed to me that there was something pretty important at stake, so I made a command decision.” He flashed a quick grin at Beverley. “And now I was wondering if I could interrupt here and be unforgivably rude…?”</p><p>“You want to steal my dinner companion…” said Crusher archly. “Go on, Commander. I’ll consider it a sacrifice for the greater good too.”</p><p>“Thank you, Doctor. Deanna?” He held out his hand. “Will you come with me?”</p><p>Deanna met his sharply focused gaze and slowly nodded. She set down her fork amongst her barely-touched meal and stood, reaching to take his proffered hand. He gave it a gentle, encouraging squeeze as he interlaced their fingers. “Thanks, Beverley, for setting me straight,” she said as she looked back at her friend.</p><p>“No problem.” Beverley smiled at both of them. “Enjoy your evening, both of you,” she said and with that returned her attention to her meal.</p><p>Will turned and took Deanna out of the mess hall. “Where are we going?”</p><p>“Home,” he said. “For some dinner and a bottle of something to celebrate my imminent clean bill of health.”</p><p>“Home?”</p><p>“Well, my quarters. What you want to call them is up to you, I guess…” His voice was calm but there was a hint of steel beneath his words, as if he was quietly but firmly laying down the gauntlet to her. She looked up at him, feeling a flush of nerves flood through her just as he glanced down, flashing her a quick, good-humoured smile. He released her hand and bumped her with his arm. “Don’t look like you’ve just been told I’m serving you live gagh.”</p><p>They walked in silence for a few moments before boarding a turbolift to change decks. “Deck Six,” called Will. As the lift shifted dutifully into action, Deanna let her mind reach out to him, wanting to feel the familiar, comforting sense of him, but he calmly and gently rejected her touch. She almost took a step back at the deflection; he’d mastered several mental blocks back on Betazed all those years ago, but she hadn’t felt the cool push away of his mind like this since they’d got back together. Feeling chastened, Deanna frowned and remained silent as they journeyed to his quarters. Will, for his part, simply stared straight ahead, the picture of composure.</p><p>When the doors opened on Deck Six, he gestured for her to exit first, which she did, and then they walked the hundred metres or so down the corridor to his cabin. The doors opened for him and he walked inside.   </p><p>Deanna stopped just inside the doors. The dining table was set for a meal and a single Muktok flower sat in a bud vase in the centre, a sentimental touch from Will. For a moment, she watched him as he busied himself at the replicator, then she began, “I’m sorry for this morning, Will. I behaved awfully.”</p><p>He stopped what he was doing and appeared to notice for the first time that she’d halted just inside the doors. He approached her. Slowly, he crooked his finger underneath her chin and lifted up until their eyes met. “Apology accepted. Don’t worry about it.” Leaning in, he kissed her. “Forgiven and forgotten.”</p><p>Relieved, Deanna admitted, “I’m not sure I could forgive myself so readily. But, thank you.” She reached up and ran the back of her fingers along his smooth cheek. “It does make you look younger. Maybe that’s why I prefer it… because I’m trying to remember when we were young.”</p><p>He didn’t say anything in return, giving her time to weigh her words and give them voice.</p><p>“Do you ever think of that time?” she asked, her voice quiet and low.</p><p>Will blinked. “Sometimes, yeah. But it’s a long time ago now, Deanna. There’s been a fair bit of water under the bridge, so to speak.” He seemed to be studying her and Deanna wondered how much of her he could see. She couldn’t feel him in her mind particularly, but she’d learnt over the years that Will Riker was an intuitive man, and he was as good at reading faces and body language as he was at commanding a starship. “Do you still think about it?” he asked.</p><p>“Sometimes…”</p><p>And then suddenly, quite unexpectedly, there were tears springing up and before she knew it, they were speeding down her cheeks. Will took her face in his hands, frowning. “Hey, hey… What’s the matter?” he soothed. But his tenderness did nothing but make her cry harder. She pressed herself hard against his chest, squeezing fistfuls of his shirt between her fingers and shaking with sobs.</p><p>“Oh Gods, Will, I’m so sorry… I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I just… I just look at you right now and all I can see is the man who left me all those years ago,” she cried. “I want to be with you, I know I’m falling in love with you again, but I can’t stop feeling like this. It’s like a hand closing around my throat.”</p><p>“Deanna, I’m not going anywhere,” he said quietly as he held her.</p><p>“I know that, I do… I just…”</p><p>“I hurt you.”</p><p>She scrunched up her face at the sombreness of his voice.</p><p>“And I think I hurt you more than you’ve ever let on. At least if this reaction is anything to go by.” He smoothed her hair and then kissed the crown of her head softly. “I am sorry for what happened between us before. I’ve felt guilty about it for a long time, but I can’t change the past. In lots of ways, the fear of hurting you again was what stopped me from trying to be with you again. I didn’t trust myself not to hurt you again if we went down that path.”</p><p>Pulling away from him, she looked up at him and shook her head infinitesimally. “But here we are… What’s changed, Will?”</p><p>“I’m not sure exactly,” he admitted, then flashed her a grin. “Maybe I’ve grown up.” He shrugged his shoulders, then moved away, pacing a distance to the other end of the living area then turning back to look at her. “When we rescued Captain Picard from the Borg and I surrendered my field commission to return to being first officer, do you remember me taking you for dinner that evening in Ten Forward?”</p><p>“I remember.”</p><p>“Well, after I dropped you back at your cabin and went back to mine, I found Guinan standing outside in the hall. I invited her in and she came and pottered around for a few minutes until I had to ask her what exactly she was here for. She looked at me like I was out of mind and told me that I was playing it safe again.” He smiled distantly at the memory. “She said she’d worked out why I was sticking here on the Enterprise and it didn’t have anything to do with prestige and all the bullshit reasons I’d given to Captain Picard. She said I was here because I was too damn scared of not having this family I’d built up on the Enterprise around me… of not having you in my life.”</p><p>He walked back towards her and picked up her hands. “She basically told me I had to quit behaving like a lost little boy and sort my relationship with you out or I’d never take the captain’s chair.” His expression flashed through amused incredulity to tenderness. “The whole exchange kind of shocked the hell out of me, so the next morning, I asked you if you wanted to come back to Angel Falls with me. I was going to make a move, Deanna. All the way to the hotel, I was planning how I was going to do it. Then when we got there, you were so happy, so comfortable and at ease…” He chuffed softly. “I just couldn’t bring myself to risk all of that because, even then, I never wanted to hurt you ever again. And so the holiday passed by and I did nothing…”</p><p>He took her face in his hands. “But here I am, Deanna. I’ve finally taken the risk. And I swear, I’m as certain about this as I ever was of anything. Please… come and live with me.”  </p><p>    </p><p>   To be continued…  </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Two</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry... this took a little longer than I was expecting to write. I spent a good few days thinking I'd forgotten how to write proper sex scenes!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Deanna met his eyes. “You’d know if I was lying…” he told her and, as she reflexively reached out mentally for the sense of him, his honesty filled her head like the warmth of sunshine.</p><p>“Oh Will…” she sighed.</p><p>He leaned in and kissed her, gently but with an insistence behind him that she couldn’t have opposed even if she’d wanted. A moment passed before she pulled back and looked at him closely again. He smiled that megawatt smile of his and she felt some of her anxiety ebb away. “Come on, let’s have dinner.”</p><p>He went to the replicator and ordered her favourite Terran dish, clam chowder, then placed two bowls of the thick fish stew down on the table. “Sit. Eat. And talk to me, Deanna…” he urged. She sat, then tried to smile at him and his earnestness. “You don’t have to look quite so pained, you know. I’m not going to interrogate you.” He paused and stuck his fork into his chowder, spearing a large chunk of fish. “But I’m afraid that I’ve got this counsellor friend and she’d say that not talking about something that’s bothering you is the worst mistake you can make.”</p><p>Deanna smiled. “She would. It’s just that, sometimes, she’s not very good at following her own advice.” She drew in a deep breath and steadied herself. “I know why I’m feeling like this, and I know it’s largely irrational, but the response I’m having verges on the instinctual – a matter of self-preservation, I suppose. Or at least, that’s how I’m trying to explain it.” To his credit, Will kept quiet and simply listened while she spoke. “There’s no way to talk this through without talking about the past, though,” she said. “I know you said that there’d been a lot of water under the bridge, and that’s true, but it doesn’t change what happened and we’ve done quite a good job of avoiding it for a long time. You’re going to hear some things you won’t have heard before, Will. Some things that won’t make you feel very good.”</p><p>Will’s eyes darkened a touch and he looked down at his meal, as if the fish stew could somehow provide him with a solution. “I suspected as much,” he said softly. “But I meant what I said earlier, Deanna. I have grown up. I can take this.” He smiled gamely. “So have at me, Counsellor.”</p><p>Deanna reached out across the table and took up his hand. “Do you remember when we realised what there was between us for the first time? At Janaran Falls.”</p><p>“The first time…”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>Smiling with the remembrance, Will murmured, “I remember standing in front of the falls, watching you swimming and feeling so much love for you that I could hardly breathe.” His eyes grew distant. “I remember you inside my head and understanding that I knew you… so completely. I remember when we made love in that little glade beside the Pool of the Moons and I realised that I’d never been closer to anyone in my life.”     </p><p>“Imzadi…” she whispered. Their fingers intertwined. “Remember afterwards when I told you what it meant to be imzadi? That we were bonded forever in a way most couples don’t ever come to realise.”</p><p>“I remember...” A faint and unusually self-conscious blush coloured his face and he swallowed as he admitted, “I remember thinking you were being a bit pretentious, I’ll confess. I mean, I knew there was something different about how I felt for you, and…” He grinned. “The sex was mind-blowing. But at the time I was too damn young and stupid to really understand what you were saying and, I guess, what it really meant.”</p><p>“Don’t beat yourself up, Will. I don’t think I understood it fully either.” She leaned across the table and took his other hand in hers, giving them both a gentle squeeze. For a moment, she studied it carefully, running her thumb over the lines of his palm, the wrinkles of his knuckles before finally continuing. “I… I knew what it was and I was certain that it was the only explanation for what had happened between us that night. But I was young too, and a little bit naïve. I went home to my mother and told her that I thought I’d experienced imzadi. I thought she would be thrilled – it is, after all, one of the most celebrated of bonds. And then when I told her, her face went pale and she looked at me like I’d told her I’d signed my own death sentence.”</p><p>“She didn’t approve of me…”</p><p>“Oh, it wasn’t that. She liked you, Will. Likes you still, even though she’s never quite conveyed it fluently. But she said that if we really had become imzadi to one another, then I should prepare myself to be hurt profoundly by you.”</p><p>Will dipped his head and closed his eyes against the truth of her words. “She knew I was going to leave when I got another posting.”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“I was an idiot… I was so caught up in this desperate need to prove myself that I had complete tunnel vision. I couldn’t see anything but those damned four pips.”</p><p>She ignored him and continued, “But back then I was certain that you would never give up on what we had. That you’d understand that to be imzadi was forever and that you wouldn’t fight that. So I told her she was being ridiculous and I carried on seeing you… and falling more and more in love with you. When you did leave, I clung so tightly to the plans we’d made for Risa and what you’d said about getting married and bringing family aboard that I lived in a state of perpetual anticipation for every subspace message we shared, every communique you sent. I would rush back from the Consulate every evening and the first thing I’d do would be to check my PADD. Then when you called to tell me about your promotion and your posting on the Hood, and how you wouldn’t be able to make it to Risa, it felt like I’d been hit by a phaser blast. For the first time, I realised that what we had was fragile and that it was about to break.”</p><p>“And that your Mother had been right.” Will looked down at the table, chastened and ashamed. Deanna could tell that right now, if he was given the chance to turn back time and make changes, he’d do it. She squeezed his hands gently, in sympathy.</p><p>“You see, Will, my Mother knew that to be imzadi with someone opened you up to the most wonderful and encompassing love, but it also opened you up to a world of pain and hurt should that bond be broken. When we became imzadi, we became part of each other’s souls.” She looked at him and realised that her eyes had filled with tears again. “You can’t split someone’s soul in two without it hurting like hell.”</p><p>“Deanna, I know I hurt you…” he began, but she stopped him with a wave of her hand.</p><p>“Will, you hurt me more than you could ever know. As an empath, I’m finely attuned to sense and read other people’s emotions, to understand them. But the side effect of that is that I’m extremely sensitive to my own feelings and emotions. Most of the time, I’ve learned to manage that side effect, but the feelings are still there. It’s why sometimes when I’m exposed to really intense emotions, it can feel overwhelming. I know that you missed me, but I felt like I’d been physically injured. For weeks afterwards, it was as if you’d torn me in half. I barely ate – I lost seven kilograms – I couldn’t stop crying. My Mother was so worried about me she brought a grief counsellor home one day.” Deanna closed her eyes, reliving the echo of the pain for the first time in years. “It sounds like I’m exaggerating or that I was wallowing, but I swear to you, Will, I was utterly lost. When we eventually spoke again, all those months later when you sent that subspace message out of the blue to wish me a happy birthday, I knew… I knew our bond had broken… I could <em>feel</em> the distance between us.”</p><p>The tears that had been building in her eyes broke over the levee and raced down her cheeks. Will stared at her, lost for words; she could feel his remorse, buffeting her like a full force gale. She let the sensation wash over her, accepting his feelings for what they were: an apology and a promise.  </p><p>They’d never talked so intimately about the end of things before. When they’d met again on the Enterprise, there had been much said, but most of it had been about setting boundaries for the future, for their working relationship. Neither one of them had wanted to face the past. “Deanna, why didn’t you ever tell me this?” His voice was quiet with a kind of shock.</p><p>“What point would there have been?” she explained with a small shrug, grappling her emotions back under control again. “We were trying to build something positive. What use would it have been to dredge up all that? It wouldn’t have been fair to you… or me. And we certainly wouldn’t have been able to build such a strong friendship if I’d dragged it all out into the light.”</p><p>He tilted his head in acknowledgement of the accuracy of her assessment. “I guess I didn’t want to talk about it either,” he admitted at length. “I felt guilty for the way things ended between us, so it was easier to move on and bury it.”</p><p>“And I let that happen, because the last thing I wanted to do was to face that pain again.” Her brows knitted together. “So when this morning, you asked me to move in with you, I had an almost instinctive response. I panicked and I lashed out at something that I knew was important to you and yet I knew I could control. I needed to test you, to prove to myself that the ground was stable and that I was still in control. I recognise all this now. But I’ve had chance to think about things, Will, and I do… I do want to do this. Just like you said you miss me, I miss you. I’ve gotten so used to spending all my time with you that I don’t think there would be any challenge at all to living in the same space. So, I know I was a horrible, horrible person this morning, and you have every right to be angry with me, but please… will you let me reconsider?”          </p><p>Will stared at her for a long moment, before he could hold in his feelings no longer. His face split in a huge grin. “Sure I will…” He stroked his clean-shaven chin. “I’d do anything for you, remember?”</p><p>Lowering her head in a flush of shame, Deanna gazed at the untouched bowl of chowder in front of her that had long since gone cold. “I think I’m starting to understand that now. Thank you, Will.”</p><p>“No problem.”</p><p>“Can we try again with dinner, too? Clam chowder isn’t very nice when it’s stone cold.”</p><p>“No, it’s not.” With a chuckle, Will stood and took their bowls away. He went to the replicator and committed the congealing chowder to the reclamator, then reordered. A few moments later, he returned to the table and set a steaming bowl of chowder in front of her. “Dig in, Deanna. If my guess is correct, all you’ve eaten all day has been a banana.”</p><p>“I had an oatcake mid-morning,” she said.</p><p>Will rolled his eyes. “Well, that’s hardly sufficient calories for the day, now, is it?”</p><p>They ate quietly, the relief at having resolved the situation making the air between them calm but also pleasantly charged. Talk was simple, about work and their friends and other easy things that required nothing more than the genuine rapport they had for one another. As they finished up the bottle of wine, Will ordered her Belgian chocolate mousse and sat back in his seat with a glass of brandy to watch while she spooned the richness into her mouth with unabashed delight.</p><p>When she finally set the spoon down and ran her finger around the rim of the bowl in a show of relaxed impropriety she only ever indulged in when she was alone, Will laughed lightly. “Good, was it?”</p><p>Deanna closed her eyes and hummed with pleasure. “Really good.”</p><p>He got up from his seat and moved around to her side of the table. “I’ll never quite understand your love for chocolate. Sweet, sticky, nasty stuff.” He held out his hand; she took it and he pulled her to standing and into his arms, sighing deep as she relaxed into his embrace.</p><p>They stayed that way for a while, just absorbing each other’s energies, until eventually, he pulled back and regarded her carefully. “You’re really ready for this?”</p><p>“It’s now or never, yes?”</p><p>“I think so.”</p><p>“Then, yes.”</p><p>His eyes sparkled. “Does all this acceptance mean that I can have my beard back too?”</p><p>Reaching up, she ran her hand over his cheek, thumb brushing over the smooth shaven skin. She nodded, then smiled and arched her brows. “Of course, Will. But you have to promise me one thing…”</p><p>“Anything,” he replied.</p><p>“Next time I’m behaving like a beast, you’ll tell me so. When I said I didn’t want to be hurt again, I didn’t mean that you should stop telling me the truth about myself.”</p><p>He nodded. “I can do that. If you promise to accept it gracefully and to always do the same for me.”  </p><p>She didn’t answer, but instead pulled him down into a deep kiss, sliding her tongue into his mouth. Taking her reaction as an affirmative, Will hummed in joyful response and took her face in his hands, returning the kiss.   </p><p>After a few moments, she pulled back to gaze at him, her eyes half-lidded. The cogs of desire were slowly turning in his head and she could feel him instinctively nudging his hips into hers.</p><p>“Well,” she said, after a moment of contemplation. “Maybe there’s something I can do for you first… And then…” She smiled wickedly, eyes fixed on his, watching the flush rise in his face as he considered what exactly she was suggesting.  </p><p>She ran her hands down his chest in one smooth motion. When she reached the waist of his pants, he shivered as her fingers insinuated themselves over the catch, then down to where there was a growing ridge beginning to tent the material. Will’s eyes fell closed and his head tilted back just enough to give him the look of a man who knew he was about to be mastered. With a gentle press she enveloped his mind with the warmth of her desire and he groaned.</p><p>Slowly, she unspooled a trail of kisses down his body until she was kneeling on the floor in front of him. “Deanna,” he began, his fingers threading into her hair.</p><p>“Shhh…”     </p><p>
  <em>Fucking hell.</em>
</p><p>She laughed as the wild thought zipped from his head to hers and he groaned again. Her hands reached up and flicked the catch on his pants, drawing in a deep breath of the warm, masculine scent of him. She pushed the material aside, waited for the pants to slide down his legs and then leaned forward to nuzzle the downy soft hair of his thigh with her cheek. Looking up at him, she saw the pure and unmistakeable love in his eyes and it made her chest contract.</p><p>She eased his waistband down and watched as his cock sprang free. Taking him in hand, she leaned forward and pressed him to her cheek. One of his hands crept into her hair, loosening it from the claw-toothed clip she had secured it with and his blue eyes opened and fixed on her. He released a shuddering breath and his hips bobbed impulsively. “Stay still,” she ordered with quiet firmness.</p><p>“I’m trying, Deanna,” he said roughly.</p><p>She kissed along the hard ridge of him, then up to the swell of the head, her hand clasped loosely at the root. With the other hand, she squeezed the back of his thigh. Will sighed. She glanced up at him and saw he was watching her still with a clouded expression. Reaching out with her tongue, she licked the underside of his cock from root to tip, smiling when she felt the burn of desire grow more intense in his mind.</p><p>
  <em>Deanna… Uh, I’m… uh…</em>
</p><p>His thoughts were primal, uncoordinated. His grip tightened in her hair, as if holding her could bring him a fraction closer to keeping control. But then, with her eyes firmly fixed on his, she sucked him down, slow and sure, until he was half-buried and nudging the back of her throat.</p><p>She heard him take a stuttering breath and the tenor of his thoughts grew decidedly erotic. With mischief in her thoughts, she teased at the glowing hot kernel of his mind, knowing well enough that if she pressed just so, it wouldn’t matter one bit what she was doing with her mouth, he’d come right there and then. She slid him clear and kissed the plane of his stomach. “Tell me what you’re feeling,” she said. “Tell me while I take you again.”</p><p>Will groaned. “I need to sit down or I might fall down,” he admitted.</p><p>With a gentle push, she pressed him backwards towards the couch, then once he was settled, took up a position between his legs and returned to her task. <em>Talk to me, Imzadi… In here if you can’t talk aloud. </em></p><p>There was something compelling about her request and he opened his mouth to tell her how she was making him feel, only for her lips to stretch around him as she drew him into her mouth again, further this time, but still slow and intent.</p><p>She felt his mind helplessly floundering for hers, wanting to think the words instead, but even that way was hard for him to appear coherent. “Deanna…” he gasped. <em>Deanna. It feels…</em> She took him deeper and he lost his train of thought again, and she felt the echo of his pleasure igniting like a plasma trail through her mind. <em>Fu… fuck.</em></p><p>At the clear and obvious fact that she had rendered him virtually speechless in every way possible, she flashed him a playful smile of delight and then grasped him firmly at the root, before sliding down his length once more. A dozen more strokes and a tiny press with her tongue on the underside and he let out a involuntary cry and came hard, like he’d been run through by an electric surge.</p><p>With a slick pop, she released him and sat back on her heels, pleased with her efforts - Will Riker, decorated and respected Starfleet commander, reduced to a quivering wreck on his own couch.</p><p>When finally he opened his eyes and saw her, he smiled dazedly. “Deanna, I’m… That was… I mean, God, that was amazing.” His eyes narrowed. “Was that part of your apology?” he asked, fighting to sit up.</p><p>She blinked in surprise at his question. “My apology? No… Well, not explicitly. But you can take it as part of it if you want.”</p><p>He looked for a moment as if he was going to launch an objection, then appeared to think better of it and deflated, sinking back into the cushions of the couch. She crawled up his body, pressing a kiss or two to his stomach and chest as she climbed, then straddled him, cradling his face in her hands. “I’d better take advantage of these clean-shaven cheeks one last time, I suppose…”</p><p>“Well, tomorrow’ll be five o’clock shadow. The day after, kinda scruffy. Day three… that’s when it’ll be back to a proper beard. So, you’ve got a couple of days yet.”</p><p>“Be careful what you promise, Will,” she warned teasingly. “I could take your offer at face value.”</p><p>“No problem at all, Deanna. You know I love to go down on you.”</p><p>She petted his face gently. “Then why are you still sitting here, Commander?”</p><p>Will’s answering grin was stellar. He stood in one fluid motion, lifting her under her thighs until she was able to wrap her legs around his waist. “Now, where shall we do this?” he teased.</p><p>“Bed,” she said, hanging onto his shoulders. “Or your back won’t thank you in the morning. We’re not twenty-five anymore.”</p><p>“You know how to wound a man, Deanna,” he grumbled good-naturedly as he carried her through to his bedroom. “What was it you called me once? Seasoned. Ugh.”</p><p>“Experienced,” she corrected.</p><p>“Yes, well, I’ll show you experienced…”</p><p>With a deliberately arch expression on his face, he laid her down on top of the sheets and began to remove her uniform, boots first, then socks and then the rest of her jumpsuit, revealing the simple black underwear she always wore beneath. His hands cupped her breasts and then found the clasp of her bra and slipped her free of it, his eyes filling with her.</p><p>Climbing above her, he kissed her eagerly, taking a long moment to explore the contours of her mouth before beginning a slow and inexorable path down her body. He travelled the soft skin of her throat, down to the hollow of her shoulder, where he ran his lips over the collarbones and paused a moment to breathe in. Slowly, he kissed his way between her breasts, then shifted his position and took a hard, pebbled nipple in his mouth, sucking first softly, then with more focus.</p><p>Deanna arched underneath him as sensation surged through her and, encouraged, he moved to perform the same task on her other nipple, until both were hard and shining in the low, yellowish light of his bedroom. Her hands pulled vainly at his shirt and, realising she wanted him naked, he paused in his journey to divest himself of it. Once free, he returned to his downward path. His mouth traced a zig-zag pattern across the plane of her belly, kissing the points of each hip, before trailing down the tensed muscle of one thigh. He hovered there a moment, his breath tickling her gently, then he nuzzled into the apex between her legs. His lips kissed the fine, downy Betazoid hair that grew there, then he used the point of his nose to push her folds apart.</p><p>
  <em>Will…</em>
</p><p>Her voice in his head was tense with anticipation and she gasped aloud. Smiling against her, he reached out with his tongue and tasted her, his touch feather-light and barely there. She pushed against him, eager for a firmer ministration, and he obliged.</p><p>“Mmm… You want more?”</p><p>In response, she gave just a quiet sigh.  </p><p>He’d made love to her so many times now that, even if they didn’t share the bond they did, he’d know exactly what to do. Will Riker was a smart man and he knew the value of study and practise and that was what he began to put into action. His mouth moved over her with a fluency that spoke of knowledge and understanding, of the years he’d known her, and his tongue worked the hard nub of her clit with strokes that alternated between swirling and sliding, firmness and gentleness.  </p><p>His thumbs massaged her thighs, creeping slowly up until he parted her folds and slipped a finger, then two, inside her. Deanna’s legs fell wide open and she stretched, toes curling, as he found that spot within her that he knew would send her spinning into a climax within minutes. <em>Will, Will… Don’t stop that…</em> she pleaded in his head. He obliged her, keeping up a rhythm that was both slow but steady. Soon, she was shifting in anticipation of release, moaning and mewling with pleasure.</p><p>“You’re so beautiful like this,” Will told her. “I could watch you forever.” His voice resonated against her skin. He gave her one last, long lick and pressed hard with his fingers and she cried out, shuddering as she came. He let her breathe for a moment, then, holding her hips still with his spare hand, he returned to stroking her and she surged into a second orgasm, this time shorter but more intense.</p><p>He let the tremors subside before sliding his fingers out of her and pressing a soft, reverent kiss to her clit. Tracing back up her stomach, he settled in beside her. She turned her head and kissed him slowly and deeply, her mouth slipping through the wetness she’d left around his mouth. “Thank you, Will,” she murmured.</p><p>He smiled in reply.</p><p>For a long moment, they simply held each other, quiet in the post-orgasmic haze. Will’s hands wandered loosely over her curves, occasionally tugging her closer. They kissed, then sighed and returned to the quiet touches and caresses.</p><p>Eventually, Will became cognisant of her thoughts turning to memory and he reached up to cup her cheek in his hand. “Imzadi,” he said. “You’re thinking of the past again.” His words were hesitant, unsure as he was of exactly what she was thinking about.</p><p>Deanna smiled wistfully and he felt some of his uncertainty ebb away. “I’m thinking of the night before you heard about your promotion,” she told him. “In the gardens at home, hoping Mother would stay out at her dinner so we could have the evening to ourselves.”</p><p>“I remember lying on that blanket on the lawn and drinking <em>chata</em>. I kept watching out for your Mother showing up; I was paranoid that she would catch us in the act,” Will said. They both laughed and he pulled her closer.</p><p>“It was dark when we finally came inside.” She paused and sighed. “And then the next morning, you got the communique from Starfleet Command. Two weeks’ later, you were gone.”</p><p>“Are you worried the same thing will happen again?” he asked.</p><p>“In darker moments, I’ve dwelt on that, yes.”</p><p>Will nodded. His hand came to rest on the curve of her hip. “Honestly, Deanna, I’m not sure if they’ll ever pull the chair out for me again. I’ve turned down three commands now and it’s been a decade since they offered me the Melbourne. I think there’s every chance that they’ll be wheeling me out of here in a box.”</p><p>“Don’t say that, Will. They just know that they can’t offer you any old vessel.”</p><p>“I hope you’re right.”</p><p>They drifted to silence.</p><p>“Do you think Guinan was right? Am I a lost little boy?”</p><p>She thought about it. “I think your childhood has made you, Will Riker,” she said in a softer version of her psychologist’s voice as she reached up to finger a strand of his hair. “Years ago, it made you desperate to prove yourself in your career. To prove to yourself and to your father that his criticisms of you were unfounded.”</p><p>Will took her observation in his stride, accepting the truth she always spoke. “And now?”</p><p>“And now… Guinan was right. You’ve always craved security, a sense of belonging, of family. When you couldn’t have it in your relationships, you sought it in your professional life.” She smiled. “Perhaps this <em>is</em> what you need, Will, and you were wrong all along. Perhaps if we make these steps forward in our relationship, you’ll feel able to step away from your comfort zone professionally and finally take that chance.”</p><p>He stared at her, one eye narrowing a touch as he considered her words. At length, he cupped his hand around her jaw, his thumb smoothing across her cheekbone. “Or perhaps we should quit all this pussyfooting around and just go and get married tomorrow.”</p><p>“And then Starfleet’ll be in touch the day after and we can zip off to whatever new ship they ask you to command.”</p><p>Will grinned in wry amusement. “I love you, Deanna. You know that, don’t you?”   </p><p>“Imzadi,” she replied and leaned in to kiss him.</p><p>The kiss deepened and he rolled atop her. “You ready to take advantage of these smooth cheeks again?” he teased as he rose up on his hands and looked down at her.</p><p>“I think I could be persuaded…”</p><p>With his eyes fixed on hers, they fell to love-making once again.               </p>
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